Tuesday 21 October 2014

Jack Frost/Ice Queen glue mask masque masquerade masked ball tutorial tips

Glue mask making tips/tutorial.
I have been dying to try this out, so I bought some extra long ( 30cm) x 11 mm hot glue sticks and had a go!
You need greaseproof paper and a template or just draw your design onto the paper if you can!
Heat your gun right up and off you go!
I used white organza as a base but you don't need to have a base as the glue builds up to a thick layer anyway, but I thought shiny white organza would look effective.
Do the outline first concentrating around the eyes and edges, and then just build up until you are happy with your design.
I put glitter in between the layers but you can wait and do that after.

Once it was dry, I roughly cut away the excess organza, I say roughly because it is too fiddly to be neat and it also leaves a nice raggedy edge that fits in well with the style.

This is the mask finished with long white sheer organza ribbon to tie.
I topped up the glitter as well ...for lots of sparkle.
You can add rhinestones, pearls and buttons, in fact anything you feel works with your design, just go mad with your glue ! lol

Once it is dry you can also use spray paints or nail varnish for your metallic and glittery effects.
Looks fab in all sorts of colours and is great fun to make! :)
 

Wednesday 15 October 2014

My latest creations! Masquerade mask masque mardi gras carnival

Musicians Masquerade!
 

I have used a serviette for this musical themed mask, musical print ribbon and fluffy black feathers.
It looks great and I think it would make a fab ornamental wall hanging in a musical orientated room!

 
PEACOCK!
This beautiful serviette/napkin looks great on this mask, finished with glitter and sparkly gems it would make a fab wall hanging for any masquerade enthusiast :)



 
 
Purple Sparklyness!
 
A gorgeous purple glitter mask, lots of sparkle and a pretty butterfly in fluffy feathers.
Perfect with a cocktail party dress!

 
Batman Stylie!
For all you Marvel fanatics!
Hand painted in metallic black and gold with bright gold embellishment KA-POW!!!

 
 
Please visit my Etsy or Folksy shop for lots more designs.
I do some commissions too!
Each mask is individual, one of a kind, I try not to repeat, although some may look similar there is always a difference!  :)
 
 
 
 

Tuesday 7 October 2014

LED carnival Mask masque masquerade carnival masked ball

Wow! I can not believe it's been about five months since my last post, where does all that time go?

I have been doing lots of craft fairs this year and my last one was at The National Space Centre for the Creator Fair weekend.

It was great meeting lots of people and one of the stalls there was run by Kitronik!    http://www.kitronik.co.uk

They introduced me to their E-Textiles & Conductive Thread which is amazing as you can sew LED lights into textiles such as handbags, clothing and toys.

I was really tempted and treated myself to their Electro-Fashion Deluxe E-Textiles Pack £14.95
 https://www.kitronik.co.uk/2728-electro-fashion-deluxe-e-textiles-pack.html but was still unsure how I could incorporate the lights into one of my masks.

I was very kindly sent a sample box as I had chatted with the guys from Kitronik and expressed an interest in using their product in some way on one of my masks.

Well...after a bit of thought I decided to add some lights to a butterfly that would be the focal of a gold masquerade mask with fluffy feathers.






I was going to use three lights but realised this would be a bit of a squash on the back of the butterfly and the thread might touch causing the lights not to work.

 After I pierced the holes in the ends of each wing, I chose my needle, not too thick but not so thin either as the thread is quite thick, it is suggested that you thread your needle with the aid of a needle threader as it is made up of several strands and frays out quite quickly, Also ...this is so much easier than trying to just push the thread through the eye of the needle.

I attached the small coin cell holder to the bottom part of the wing with the conductive thread...
  making sure that I went through the holes at least half a dozen times as this gives the lights a good strong connection once the battery is added.

I then carefully stitched along the pattern of the butterfly so that the conductive thread wouldn't intrude too much on the design side. I sewed through the negative hole of the LED that I had earlier curled into small hoops with my round nose pliers once again going through several times and then continued to stitch across the butterfly until I reached the negative hoop of the opposite LED.


After placing a small square of sticky backed felt carefully over the negative connection, I then sewed in the same way again but joining the positives together. I put the felt over the thread as I knew the positive thread was going to touch the negative side and this would mean the lights not working.
 
 
The coin cell battery was placed into the holder and I was very pleased with the effect.
Once I had finished the mask I attached the butterfly to the side amongst the feathers and WOW!
 
 I love it!
 

 
The battery is easily accessible and should last long enough for an evening at a  Masquerade Ball!
 
Please visit Kitronik's website and take a look at the Electro-fashion E-Textiles.
You can find them on Facebook and Twitter too!